Highlights:
- Raw New Year’s Eve
- Briefly milder Monday with showers
- Snow prospects mid week
Busy Times…Clouds will increase late tonight and give way to showers during the daytime New Year’s Eve. Most of this shower activity will be light, but you’ll want to carry the rain gear with you as you leave for New Year’s Eve parties and celebrations throughout central IN. Once to the nighttime hours, showers should diminish and most of the nighttime should feature rain-free conditions, along with colder temperatures.
New Year’s Day may start out with some sunshine, but clouds will increase through the day and drizzle or light rain is possible by evening. Low pressure will track northeast from the central Plains into the upper Mid West Monday. This will place Indiana in a relatively warm southwest flow. Periods of showers can be expected through the day, along with breezy conditions. An accompanying cold front will sweep through the state early Tuesday morning and shut rain chances off, shift winds to the northwest, and lead to falling temperatures.
Wednesday will be a day in between storm systems. Cold high pressure will settle into the Ohio Valley and supply unseasonably chilly temperatures, but with sunshine.
Our next storm system will approach Thursday. Clouds will increase Wednesday night and give way to an expanding snow shield during the day Thursday. We still have a few days to look at things, but from this distance, the potential is present for an impactful wintry event across a widespread portion of the Ohio Valley, including central Indiana. Stay tuned. Fresh arctic air will move in to put a close on yet another short work week.
Upcoming 7-Day Precipitation Forecast:
Snowfall: 1″ – 3″
Rainfall: 0.75″ – 1.25″
By Day (10), the cold pattern is well established over the Lower 48. This is a coast-to-coast cold signal (heart of the cold centered over the west and central) depicted by the European ensemble, along with other modeling.
Teleconnections support a cold pattern returning.
The agreement amongst teleconnections is nice to see and ups confidence in the overall direction of where this pattern is heading in regards to colder than average times looming. The negative PNA correlates nicely with the SE ridge that continues to make itself heard from time to time over the next few weeks. It should also be noted that the phases of the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) become more of a factor for mid and late winter.
Accordingly, we see the ensemble data flipping to a colder pattern over the upcoming (10) days. Note the low anomalies in the higher latitude regions today (Image 1) versus Day 10 (Image 2).
The pattern developing by Day (10) is one capable of producing another frigid regime- only January style. Cross-polar flow sets up shop and, unlike, December, some blocking is noted, as well. This can help the mean storm track shift further south. (Bye-bye Great Lakes cutters, though Mid Western and Ohio Valley Snow Lovers will find a new worry in the form of suppression potential ;-)). Individual storms will have their respected challenges, as always. As a whole, it’s a very cold, stormy look and a pattern capable of leading to an expanding snow pack across the Lower 48.
We note ensemble data is suggesting high latitude blocking tries to develop towards Day 10. Recall this was the missing ingredient in the bitterly cold blasts of air that occurred during the first few weeks of December. Both the GEFS and EPS agree on the increasingly blocky look to the pattern by Day 10. This would help drive a cold, stormy pattern by early January. Instead of storms cutting, we would see more suppression. With a “stubborn” southeast ridge, things could get interesting across the Ohio Valley from a wintry perspective….
We don’t want to jump the gun, but it the positives can “hook up” over the pole, we stand the chance of locking into a rather lengthy cold, snowy regime as we rumble deeper into the heart of winter.
Summary: A rather mild regime remains as we rumble through Christmas before trending more seasonable next week. From a wintry perspective we need to continue to keep an eye on the period around New Year’s Eve/ Day. Confidence continues to increase on the potential of a return of arctic air come early January.
This is, of course, is in stark contrast to December 2015.
As we move forward, an active pattern awaits between now and the end of the year. This comes after a few days to catch our breath, including moderating temperatures leading up to Christmas.
Christmas Eve will feature overcast skies with areas of fog and drizzle, but the majority of the concentrated rain should fall south of the region. Santa’s ride into central IN should be uneventful, weather-wise.
Temperatures will fall through the day Monday and we should run much closer to seasonable temperatures next week. A couple of additional storm systems will have to be monitored for rain and snow prospects the middle of next week and again around New Year’s Eve/ Day. Initially, we’ll be rather mild, but there may be more in the way of cold air readily available to make the storm system around New Years “more interesting” from a wintry perspective.
